Walpole to Pemberton via the Great Forest Trees Drive

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It was very quiet at the motel overnight and no hogs waking us this morning! It would seem that they do the bulk of their business over the weekends as there were only three guest vehicles in the car park overnight and our party of four accounted for two of those. After packing up all our gear again, we returned to the bakery to buy some morning tea and lunch supplies. They didn’t have quite as many sandwiches to choose from this morning and, when it came to the cakes, tragedy, the refrigerated display cabinet was playing up and it had frozen the vanilla slices!! The proprietor did not want to sell spoiled stock, but Bernie insisted that it would be fine as he didn’t want to eat it straight away and it would thaw out by morning teatime!

We’re heading inland today but had a couple more coastal stops planned for the morning before heading north. Our first stop was at John Rate Lookout. Initially we though pfft, we’re not going to be able to see anything but for the trees! We followed the boardwalk with little expectation of a great view but when we reached the viewing platform, lo and behold, a gap in the trees and a view looking out to the Southern Ocean.

Next stop the parking area at the trailhead for the Mount Clare Summit Trail. A Class 3, two-kilometre return trail which gave us another chance to enjoy the tall timbers of the karri and tingle trees. This was our last sighting of the mighty tingles as they grow in such a small area of WA. Except for very isolated specimens they do not grow more than ten kilometres from the coast and only between Deep River in the west and Bow River in the east so grow almost exclusively in a restricted area of the Warren region.

The tingle trees have been inspiring. It’s amazing to see something with such a strong will to survive for hundreds of years despite the onslaught of insects, fungus and fire. We saw one burnt out trunk that was once a tree with an impressive girth. By rights it should be dead but still there was a tenacious trunk growing from the leftmost margin of the burnt-out buttress. Amazing! We also found ourselves walking another tiny section of the Bibbulmun Track. That’s maybe one kilometre completed 999 to go, ha, ha.

We drove a little further west and pulled out onto the Mandalay Beach Road which took us into D’Entrecasteaux National Park for the first time. As we drove along the dirt track Tracey spotted a kangaroo sitting on the road. They’re OK as long as they stay at the side of the road. Near the sand road to Banksia Camp, we spoke briefly with a guy stopped at the roadside with his bonnet up. All good, he’d been out to Banksia Beach so was putting air back in his tyres. He had caught some bream and some whiting on his foray out to the beach.

Arriving at the car park we found we were back in a national park where an entry fee applies. All the parks around Walpole – Mt Frankland and Mt Frankland South NP and Walpole-Nornalup NP – are free entry. The only activity that cost us was the Tree Top Walk which was $21.00/head for Seniors. Still, that was another $10.00/vehicle entry fee, so we have now recouped $60.00 of our $70.00 one-month entry pass.

We walked down yet another excellent and accessible path lined with Agonis trees to Mandalay Beach, rounded a corner and – Wow! – we had a fantastic view out to Chatham Island on a glorious blue-sky morning. We stopped at the plaque commemorating George Vancouver’s expedition of 1791-1795 during which he charted the south coast starting here at Chatham Island (although he identified it as a cape at the time) and finishing at Termination Island south of Esperance. Part of his mission was to take possession of the land seen ‘north-west of Chatham Cape so far as we might explore its coasts’. And yet his plaque is not daubed with red paint or otherwise defaced. The difference between being located down a dirt track in the wilderness rather than in a capital city??

The beach looked spectacular with a backdrop that included Chatham Island and Cliffy Head. Chatham Cape/Island was not a very imaginative name. George looked no further than the name of the armed tender accompanying HM sloop Discovery. Once again, we found ourselves walking a tiny portion of the Bibbulmun Track. At this point after a section along Mandalay Beach hikers climb the stairs to the car park and then head north away from the coast towards Mount Burnett.

Coincidentally Tracey was reading JenGog’s blog yesterday on the Travel Blog site and the travellers were in Chatham in Kent, England having a discussion about how it should be pronounced. This morning here we at an island (cape) named Chatham by George Vancouver! How should it be pronounced? Chat-ham or with a soft ‘th’ sound in the middle?

OMG how will we get to the next activity on our agenda – the Great Forest Trees Drive near Shannon Campground – we have no phone signal. Guys, Tracey said, we have a map and all we need to do is drive back out to the South Western Highway, turn left and then watch for the sign(s) saying Shannon Campground … besides which we will probably see a tourist drive sign too once we get there. It was like the members of the rest of the party has lost an appendage because they couldn’t program a destination into the SatNav??!!

Despite the fact that we have the paper map Bernie HAD to pull up when we reached the highway to put Shannon Campground into Apple Maps because, hallelujah, the phone signal had been restored. When Tracey questions this obsession she is told that it is worth doing because Apple can provide warnings about road conditions. Hmmn?!

Soon after rejoining the highway, we saw cleared fields where we would have expected to see sheep or cattle grazing but, instead the fields were full of Emus grazing. After about 40 minutes on the road ta dah, there was a sign pointing right for the Great Forest Trees Drive. Not hard to find at all. We stopped at the shelter at the beginning of the drive. The map there showed us a little bit more detail about the drive alerting us to the fact that there are several info boards to watch out for along the way. Tracey particularly liked the pertinent quote at the bottom of the board ‘There is no WiFi in the forest, but I promise you a better connection’. The author was unknown but … Tracey agrees!!

Off onto another dirt road looking at the trees of course and on the watch for Shannon Dam. The dam was built in 1949 to supply water to the Shannon Mill and town. The original dam wall was washed away after a huge downpour the following winter but was quickly rebuilt and remains to this day even thought the mill and town are long gone.

At the next stop ‘Which Tree Is That?’ We learnt how to distinguish between the Jarrah (Eucalyptus marginata), marri (Corymbia calophylla, also commonly known as bloodwood) and the karri trees. It’s easy when they are side by side with signs in front of them! We had noted that the forest showed signs of a bushfire BUT the karri trees looked pristine. Now we know why, karri trees shed their bark annually so if they have been burnt, as long as they haven’t been burnt to death, they will shed the burnt bark and look as good as new within a year.

At the ‘Melaleucas’ sign it was explained why we had experienced such a change in vegetation. We were now in an area with different soil and swampy in nature supporting more paperbacks and sedges and yet another species of eucalypt, this time blackbutts (Eucalyptus patens).

We crossed the highway to pick up the rest of the loop to the south stopping briefly at the Curtin Tank. With forest fires an ever-present threat this tank was built as a water source for fire fighters. The sign didn’t say when it was built, but it was named after John Curtin who was Prime Minister between 1941 and 1945. Perhaps it was built around that time??

The info board at Snake Gully had pictures of all the birds that inhabit the forest here. Fourteen birds were listed, and we could HEAR lots of birds, but they were very difficult to see even after we sat quietly in the hope that they might get used to our presence. It would have been awesome to see a Carnaby’s cockatoo or a Wedge-tailed eagle but no such luck! We saw a few wrens hopping about at a distance and a few birds flying around way, way up in the karri canopies.

Our next stop was in the Big Tree Grove amongst some truly enormous karri trees. The trees are about 300 years old and over 85-metres in height. Just impossible to take photos that do them justice, so we decided to break out our sandwiches and commune with them while we ate!! The poor old things are so ancient they are described as being ‘in decline’ due to their advanced age. They are unable to repair damage or replace leaves as quickly as younger trees and they will eventually die creating a gap in the forest that will be filled by new, young karri trees.

Our final stop was at Inferno Hill where the damage caused by a bushfire in January 2015 can still be seen. While there are still signs of the damage, there are also signs of recovery. The Australian bush is so resilient.

On the way back to Shannon Campground Bernie ran over a snake. Tracey missed it! Her eyes might have been closed? Did you see it on the road behind us? It’s not going to be wrapped around an axle or flipped up into our engine bay is it??? Ugh!

Shannon Campground was an uninspiring looking place, so we decided it was time to complete our journey to Pemberton. We made our way back to the South Western Highway and headed west. The lady at the Walpole Visitor Centre had said to cut across on Grays Road and … the SatNav agreed. What neither of these sources disclosed was that Grays Road is a very corrugated teeth chattering road! Never mind, the truck is so full of red dust a little bit more is not going to matter at this point.

Although the road was tough going it was interesting to travel through Pemberton’s agricultural district. There was a huge dam, Lake Janis, that the farmers are using to irrigate their fruit trees and pasture for stock. After driving through so much dry scenery all of a sudden it was verdant.

After 20 or so bone jarring minutes on Grays Road it was a welcome relief to turn onto the Vasse Highway for our final approach to Pemberton. Arriving about 3.15pm we made our way straight to the Visitor Centre to confirm our activities for tomorrow. Then we had to head up the hill, right up the hill to the Karri Forest Motel which is SO MUCH NICER than the Walpole Hotel Motel.

But … it’s costing us $61.00 more per night! Another $61.00 gets you a much larger, much more modern room, with bedside tables AND bedside lamps, a desk with a chair AND a table with three more chairs. That will make it much easier to eat breakfast in the morning. For the last two nights, Tracey dragged in one of the plastic outdoor chairs and wiped it down with an antiseptic wipe to use that as a bedside table! Sometimes you gotta be a bit resourceful.

After transferring our gear into the room, we popped back down into town to fill the truck with diesel. Still expensive at $202.9/litre. Then around to the IGA to top up on breakfast supplies.

There was some debate about walking down to the pub for dinner. It’s all very well to walk down the hill, but that means walking back up the hill after we’ve eaten. The craziest thing was that Cathy had put it in Google Maps which had told her it would be a mostly flat 12-minute walk!! Having driven up and down and then back up again we could definitely see that there was a hill involved! But we managed it. A nice easy downhill walk to the pub while there was still daylight. A bit of a slog back up the hill by streetlight supplemented with torchlight after dinner.

News is that the Eyre Highway is closed AGAIN, but this time due to flooding at Eucla. How crazy it that? Closed last month at Balladonia due to bushfires, closed again this month due to flooding. Steve is already talking about whether we are going to need to make alternative plans if the road is closed. With 12 days to go before we’ll be heading back through Eucla it’s probably not worth stressing about it just yet.



Steps: 12,769 (8.30kms)

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